Mooring Dynamics Experiment - Determination of a Verified Dynamic Model of the WHOI Intermediate Mooring.

Oceanographic measurements obtained from moored buoy systems are corrupted by the effects of mooring motion. To compute these effects and to design better moored systems, accurate mathematical descriptions of mooring dynamics and instrument dynamic response are needed. The report addresses the problem of mooring dynamics. The design and verification of a model for the low frequency dynamics of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution WHOI Intermediate Mooring is described. A computationally efficient model was verified in the time domain using generalized least-squares techniques. Construction of this model involved iteration upon important system parameters and descriptions of physical processes in the light of the experimental data obtained from a full scale ocean test conducted jointly with WHOI. Model errors were defined, and procedures for obtaining greater accuracy through improved experiments are outlined. Preliminary results are presented on the development of potentially more effective maximum likelihood techniques for model parameter estimation. Modified author abstract